Duplicity in Faith

Introduction

Greet and Endear

Today I want to go deep and before the end of term - touch on an issue that we really need to talk about.

Why does the biblical faith sometimes not seem to come alive in our life?

Why does faith seem like sometimes it’s just lacking in power?

Why does the faith that we see today seem like it’s so powerless compared to the one we read in the bible - what happened to the power of transformation, what happened to the miracles, the encounters?

I’d like to talk about a word today: Duplicity. This word means literally - deception by pretending to feel and act one way while you’re really feeling and acting another way.

In other words - fakeness, hypocrisy - the ability to think that the Christian faith is nothing more than just turning up to church on a Friday or a Sunday, and that’s it.

Thinking we’re able to do our own thing during the week without having to worry about it - and then we just return to church on a Friday once the week is over.

THIS is why faith seems so weak nowadays - THIS is why the power is gone and encounters aren’t the same anymore

Faith has become cheap to us - it has become so meaningless that we outrightly live duplicitous lives, fake faith - we may even boast about it.

This is a faith killer today - living a double life when it comes to faith.

And it’s something we need to address. Let’s take a look at what it says in the Word.

**PRAY**

The loss of Reverence (v5)

1 John 1:5–9 (ESV)

5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The context we need to know here is that John was addressing a specific heresy called Gnosticism.

This was a cult that claimed to have fellowship with God but were living in very morally compromised ways - they had fake faith, they were living duplicitous lives.

I don’t want to make this sermon complex in any way - I want to keep it as simple as possible because you need to catch how profound it is.

sometimes we can read the bible and miss what the actual meaning of the passage is because we never pause to think about it. And this passage is one of the ones I find we do this often.

John talks about 3 things that the Gnostic cult has lost - 3 things that those who are dulplicitous (fake faith) have lost which has turned what was once perhaps a real faith - into a fake one, a powerless one.

1 John 1:5 (ESV)

5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

God is holy - we can never forget this - this is where everything begins. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, it is the start point of the Christian faith.

You worship a HOLY God. A God who is not like any other.

When we approach Him like He is just another, when we choose to neglect His holiness - this is when a life of duplicity kicks in because we no longer take Him seriously

His Word ceases to become absolute - it just becomes a guidance. And so things like sin - which He warns us about constantly - starts to leak into our lives because we fail to heed His warning.

All because - we do not approach God as we should, with fear - and trembling.

When the fear of God leaves our lives - we turn a blind eye to sin, we live the way we want - not the way He has ordained for us Christians to live.

Listen to me carefully when I say this guys - God CANNOT be mocked, He always has the last say - and does not take commitments lightly.

He is a jealous God, jealous for your attention, jealous for your love - and rightfully so because as a Christian this is a COMMITMENT you have made to Him.

And man - God will do what it takes to hold His loved ones accountable to their commitment. God CANNOT be mocked.

1 Corinthians 6:20 (ESV)

20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

If you know your freedom was purchased with a price - and as a Christian you would know that price was hefty; don’t mock it. Don’t mock God.

By living the way you want, doing the things you want, you slander His name - and the commitment that you made. You are mocking God.

A Holy God must be approached with reverence - and losing that reverence is the first sign that we are walking in duplicity.

ILLUSTRATION: The Ocean + Weiwei

I hate the ocean, I’ve always hated it. It doesn’t help that I don’t like swimming, but the sand gets everywhere, the water is salty - there are things in the Ocean that I don’t even want to know about. You get burned - ugh it’s just the worst. So whenever people would be like come to the beach and hang out with us - I would always say no, because I hate the ocean. So I’ve never understood when people are like - you know if you want to feel small go and stand in front of the ocean. I’m like, why? It’s just water, it’s loud, it’s smelly, it’s annoying.

That changed around 10 years ago. When one of my friends was walking by the ocean in Esperance, and tripped and fell down a small ledge of rocks into the ocean. He was actually ok at first, laughing about it - but he got sucked in by a current, and we didn’t see him again. The divers found his body nearly a week later. And the crazy thing about it was there were barely any waves, it wasn’t like an incredibly stormy day or anything of the sort. Just a normal day with nominal weather.

You know that changed the way I saw the ocean. During the week they were searching for his body I remember driving to the ocean at night to pray for him - Cottesloe beach - and I got out of my car and I just stood in front of the ocean, and I felt - for the first time in my life - fear. I noticed everything, the waves were deafening, the sheer vastness of what was before me, the darkness was endless, there was a violence in the ocean that I had never noticed before - and I just stood there, almost too scared to move. My friend’s death was a revelation to me - a revelation of reverence.

So it is too with us and God - how many of us have treated God like a clown, but it’s because we’ve never met Him. We’ve never had the real encounter with Him, we’ve never felt His power - for whatever reason. Maybe we haven’t even wanted to, maybe we haven’t even cared, maybe we’re just here for our friends. Listen to me - if you call yourself a Christian - seek an encounter with God. You will quickly realise that reverence is the MOST appropriate response when you encounter Him.

The loss of relationship (v6)

The next verse in the passage is the main verse that I want to talk about today.

This is one that we read and just skim through far too often - but it bears such simple, yet profound significance.

1 John 1:6 (ESV)

6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

When reverence is lost - soon after, we begin to lose our fellowship, our relationship with God.

This verse, when taken at face value, quite literally means that you CANNOT say that you have a relationship with God while you are walking a path of darkness

This is just lying to yourself

When John says “we do not practise the truth” it means that we are not living the faith as it is meant to be lived. We are not practising a true faith - we have a fake faith.

You cannot claim to have a relationship with God and yet walk in the darkness.

You’re not dumb - the significance here cannot possibly be lost on you.

There is no such thing as a duplicitous faith - a duplicitous faith is a fake faith, it is not real.

There is no such thing as being a two faced Christian, there is no such thing as living two lives, one in church and the other outside of church.

If you choose to walk a path of WILLING sin outside these four walls then your fellowship with God INSIDE the church is false - you are lying to yourself.

God is either Lord of all or not at all.

He doesn’t just have a say in your life when you’re inside a building. You don’t DO church, you ARE the church. God is God in all spheres of your life - you don’t get to pick and choose where.

How do you act when you’re at school - surrounded by your friends. Take a moment to think.

Are you living a life of faith - standing out for Christ in the schools? Because that’s what we call out about faith so much.

We claim that God isn’t at work, we’re not seeing the miracles, we’re not seeing the people coming to Christ, the “revival”

Well firstly - are you even being a vessel that God can use outside of the church in your school, with your friends and family?

Are you on fire - living a life in obedience to God, filled with fire and faith, a light revealed, a city on a hill ?

Or are you scared of what people will think when they find out you’re a Christian, so you find it easier just to blend in.

We complain that God is not at work and that the faith is powerless but we are the ones who strip it of its power by living compromised lives.

I think it’s fair that if you live a biblical life you get to expect biblical results

And since we’re not seeing biblical results - well, you can figure out the rest.

2 Corinthians 5:17 (ESV)

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

When you choose to become a Christian - the old man is gone, the new must come about.

ILLUSTRATION: Fake Watch

When I was younger, I went back to Malaysia and my dad bought me a fake rolex submariner 40mm. The original cost around 10-15k, this one probably cost me around $10AUD. The thing is this watch could fool anyone, like nobody could tell the difference. It was actually a well-made fake. It wasn’t a folex or something it was like real, and you know people would actually believe that it was a real rolex - I managed to fool everyone.

One day, years later, the watch stopped working. But by this time I was so used to wearing it - and I really liked the watch so I took it in for a servicing. Watches of Switzerland on Hay St Mall, a good reputable dealer - I’d be happy to pay like $50-100 for a service since the watch was so cheap and looked so good.

So I made my way there and I handed the watch over to the man - this turd held it for quite literally 3 seconds before looking at me and saying, “this is a fake, isn’t it?” I said - yeah it is but I’d like to service it because it’s been working fine. He just handed the watch back to me and said - “sorry, we don’t service fakes here.” And I took it to a few service centres but no watch maker wanted to service a fake watch.

What’s the point of telling you this story? Simple. A fake faith can fool anyone, man you may even be able to semi-convince yourself that what you’re doing is legitimate. But you can’t fool the master, you can’t fool your maker. You can’t fool God.

Matthew 7:21 (ESV)

21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.

The loss of conscience (v8)

The final thing that the Gnostics had lost is their conscience. They were no longer able to discern that what they were doing was wrong - this is truly terrifying to me.

1 John 1:8 (ESV)

8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

They thought that despite what they were doing, they were not doing anything wrong - they had no sin.

To them - their morally compromised faith was a perfectly acceptable expression of their relationship with God.

John was quick to tell them that the truth had left them - there was nothing more left to say.

And this is the saddest part, when we walk a life filled with duplicity - we end up lying to ourselves and buying INTO the lie that this kind of faith, this way of life is acceptable to God.

My friends - do not fool yourselves, it is not.

God cannot be mocked - this kind of lifestyle flies in the face of even the most basic biblical truth.

God is no longer God anymore. You have taken His place - and this is why you will live the way that you want, you have made an idol of yourself and your life is nothing more than an altar to yourself.

At this point - there really is no more fellowship with God.

Repentence and Redemption (v9)

But you know what - there is a way back. John details it clearly here and it is one of the most powerful and revealing verses in the entire bible

1 John 1:9 (ESV)

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

My friends, God remains faithful - even when we are not.

He remains ready to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from whatever unrighteous decisions we may have made.

God stands at the READY to receive ANY believer who may be living a life of duplicity

He stands ready to take back any believer who may have walked away and ignored His truth

THAT’S the kind of God that we worship, He loves and loves us even when we are walking in the opposite direction of Him - even THOUGH He is holy beyond our comprehension, even THOUGH he deserves all our reverence - He CHOOSES to love us through all that.

He CHOOSES to have fellowship with us, He CHOOSES to send His son as a sacrifice just so that YOU have a path back to Him.

THAT’S the God we worship. That’s the God you committed to.

Romans 2:4 (ESV)

4 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?

God is ready to receive us back - it doesn’t matter how far you’ve walked away, the door is always open.

Would you turn and face Him again?

**KEYS UP**

ILLUSTRATION: Real Watch

This is the watch I was talking about earlier - except it’s not. This is a real Rolex Submariner, and before you stone me and call me a prosperity gospel - it was a wedding gift from my Dad. He bought it for me in 2015 for the price that I told you about earlier.

You know something? There was a way to spot the fake watch, if you observed closely. With the fake one - I would treat it like crap, I would bang it on the table, the wall, I’d misplace it, I’d let whoever wanted to see it hold it. Because deep down I know that it was fake - I know that it’s worth exactly $10AUD. So the way that I treated that watch reflected it’s value.

With this watch - I never let it out of my sight, I’m so careful with where I bring it, I only usually wear it to formal events like weddings, I polish it, I service it, I’ll fight anyone that tries to take it off me - I treat it well. Why? Because I know exactly what it’s worth and the way that I treat the watch reflects it’s value.

If your faith is truly worthless to you - you will treat it like it’s trash. You will swear, sleep around, act out, abuse your body, gossip/slander, hate. Because to you - that’s the perceived value of your faith. It’s not worth the trouble of preserving. It’s cheap to you.

But if you understood that your faith came at the cost of Jesus’ life - that He died just so that He could have a relationship with you. Then you’d obey His commands, you’d treat yourself with respect, you would love on others, you would be careful of your words, you would sacrifice, you would do anything to preserve it - because you know the value of your faith - it’s precious to you.

Altar Call

In this place - God is calling us to end duplicity. He is calling you to put an end to the fake faith that you may have been living.

And friends, listen to me - IT DOES NOT MATTER how far you may have walked in the other direction, it does not matter what sins have been committed, NO sin is greater than the kindness and love that Christ offers you today.

Come to the altar, and turn away from that life - and seek God genuinely.